Three Indonesian clubs fined by FIFA for Twitter leaks

Persebaya Surabaya, Persires Bali Devata and PSIS Semarang have all received hefty fines for publishing confidential transfer data through Twitter.

According to the AP, FIFA has said that the three clubs were punished for “breaching their obligation to keep data contained within the FIFA Transfer Matching System strictly confidential.” This marks the first time that FIFA has sanctioned social media offenses by member clubs.

Persebaya Surabaya and Persires Bali Devata were each fined 25,000 Swiss francs (US $25,800) for “publishing confidential data” and PSIS Semarang was fined 15,000 Swiss francs (US $15,500) for “republishing those tweets and publishing a confidential letter sent to them by FIFA TMS.”

The Transfer Matching System (TMS) is an online monitoring system that was made mandatory for all FIFA member associations in 2010. The aim of TMS is to improve and expedite cross-border transfers between two clubs. Its use requires that both clubs involved in a deal input the same financial information prior to FIFA approving the deal. Not gamnble it away at Judi Bola Indonesia.

TMS was set up to make transfers “quicker, smoother and, most importantly, more transparent.” It is used to monitor transfers of players from one team to another and stop money laundering through the use of fictitious characters.

When it debuted in October 2010, Britain’s Telegraph lauded the system and said it would “cut through the jungle” and end the worst excesses of the previously unregulated market. The system has been generally successful and many of the excesses have stopped.

The TMS system requires both the sending and receiving club to enter the same information on both ends prior to the deal being approved. It has the advantage of making both clubs accountable for the arranged deals and includes player IDs, payments to agents, total fees and verifiable proof of payment. Once the details between both clubs match exactly, the deal is allowed to proceed.

This creates a trail for auditors to follow if irregularities are discovered in the arrangement and makes accountability a quantifiable issue with the different clubs involved in the trade. It also speeds up the process of transferring players. A deal can be completed within 7 minutes using TMS versus trades not being completed within the 30-day window under the old system.